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Have you ever seen a bad Meryl Streep movie? Didn’t think so.
Hugh Grant turns in a totally sterling performance
Simon Helberg (Howard Wolowitz from The Big Bang) steals many a scene as her gay accompanist who finds it hard to keep a straight face but comes to be caught up in the typhoon of Florence’s enormous self-belief.
The film is based on the true story of the New York socialite Florence Foster Jenkins. In 1944 she hired Carnegie Hall to perform as a soprano soloist. With no musical ability whatsoever but a large inheritance to enable her to indulge her love of performing, Florence Foster Jenkins becomes an unwitting musical clown which sustains the comedy throughout the film. The character is played with gentle comic affection by Meryl Streep.
Finally someone who sings worse than me.
On the anniversary of her death on November 26, 1944, Carnegie Hall’s Archives and Rose Museum Director Gino Francesconi remembers the career and single Carnegie Hall appearance of one of the most colorful “divas” ever to have performed here: Florence Foster Jenkins.
One of the archival concert programs that we are most often asked for is from a vocalist. It’s not Enrico Caruso, and it’s not Maria Callas or Geraldine Farrar. It’s a singer by the name of Florence Foster Jenkins.
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